Points of Light
by Aaron Nowack
Summary: A bit late, but this is a short bittersweet New Year's fic featuring Sailor Saturn.


Points of Light  
A Sailor Moon Fanfic  
By Aaron Nowack  
  
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Disclaimer: Sailor Moon is not mine, as I am not Naoko Takeuchi. This  
fic brought to you by the "number" i and the secret letter after z whose  
name may not be spoken, lest its fearsome attention be attracted. Ia!  
Ia! *CENSORED* ftaghn!  
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A thousand points of light.  
  
More than that, to be honest. But, counting would take quite  
some time, and one thousand was a pleasing number. All those zeros.  
  
A zero meant nothing. Not as in no meaning, but as in the  
absence of something. It was amazing how simple, yet complicated that  
concept was.  
  
And one was the opposite of zero. One meant a singular  
existence, a lone figure standing against the void. Out of nothing,  
something.  
  
And she was one. At her back was darkness, a massive silent  
abyss. All consuming, implacable. It did not know she existed. It  
could not know anything. For, to know, one had to be. And it was not.  
Unformed and void.  
  
Before her were the lights. Each was a soul, a living being. A  
life's worth of joys, of sorrows, of loves, of hatreds. A window into  
that which made each person unique. They were all ones, but they were  
not alone.  
  
For two ones make a two. Add another, and you have three.  
Every other number could be made by adding ones. The blue-green Earth  
was made out of an uncountable number of ones.  
  
But a zero could not be made by adding ones. It could only be  
created by removing them. By destroying them, feeding them into the raw  
abyss from which they had come.  
  
Her job was to make zeros.  
  
It took five words for her to don the uniform of her profession,  
the uniform that brought terror into those who knew what it meant. Her  
tool quivered under her touch, expectant. A grim smile appeared on her  
face as she raised it, let it hang threateningly over the unknowing  
points of light.  
  
"Death," she whispered, and her tool began to glow with a harsh  
light...  
  
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The celebration had been just going into high gear. She did not  
know why she had agreed to attend. This was not a happy day, not for  
her. At least, not for the past few years.  
  
It was an hour and a half till midnight. Someone, she wasn't  
sure who, had gotten their hands on a bottle of some alcoholic beverage,  
and someone else had prematurely discovered it and introduced it to the  
party.  
  
She did not drink. It would not have been appropriate. She  
glanced around the room, wondering whether any of them would be gathered  
in a year's time. Even without... it, there were far too many chances  
for one to not survive.  
  
The past year had not been an easy one. The world had teetered  
on the edge of destruction more than once this past year. Some had lost  
their lives in halting it. There had been dark events, forbodings of  
the great evil to come. The inevitable evil that would finally lay  
claim to this insignificant, magnificent world.  
  
It would come, she knew. She knew it in her bones, in her  
heart, her mind, her soul. It would come, and all those gathered here  
would fail. It would come, and all would fail.  
  
The other knew this, but they did not know it the way she knew  
it. They had been warned, more than the billions that would never know  
what had occurred when it came. But they squandered that warning. They  
could not truly believe. They had seen it, but they could not believe.  
  
It was perhaps the tragedy of the whole thing. Because they  
could not believe, they could not prepare. They could not spend this  
night with their families, they could not guard them against the  
onslaught to come.  
  
Instead, they could party. Party on the night before the end of  
the world.  
  
She rose, and walked to the two who knew better than the rest.  
"Mama, Papa," she said quietly. "It's time."  
  
A sad look passed between the two, and they quickly made their  
excuses to the others. Silently, she followed them out of the party.  
  
The time drew near.  
  
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She looked over her shoulder. There it lay. Void.  
Destruction. And she would feed it. It was her destiny.  
  
She turned her attention back to her tool. It was warm to the  
touch, even to her gloved hands. It quivered, excited that it would  
finally fulfill its purpose, the goal for which it had allowed itself to  
be contained and forged so long ago.  
  
For it was alive, in its own way. It did not truly have a mind,  
but it had a certain awareness. And it had power. Great power,  
unmatched by anything in the universe. It had been for that power that  
its ancient makers had allowed themselves to be drawn into its devil's  
bargain.  
  
She had hoped that there was another that matched it. A light  
to its darkness, a creator to its unmaker. But that which she had  
rested her hopes on was not enough. It could not defeat that which  
came, that which she would bring.  
  
And it too would be returned to the void. The most powerful  
artifact of creation, unmade as though it had never existed, along with  
all else. And it would be her fault.  
  
She nearly sighed. But that would have taken emotion, emotion  
that was being drained out of her by the harsh, unfeeling light she had  
created. Her mind was empty, as it had to be.  
  
Her tool swung down, seeming of its own volition. At the last  
moment its descent halted, replaced by a sideways movement. As it  
reached the opposite side of her body, it swung upward, the cold light  
trailing it like an unholy ribbon.  
  
She moved it in an impossible pattern, seemingly random. It  
took the tool's blade all around her, never quite reaching the ground.  
The movements came instinctively, out of a part of her she had never  
known existed.  
  
And then she stopped, as the tool returned to its original  
position. The light surrounded her, chilling her to the bone. She was  
ready. Her mouth opened, and with her throat dry she uttered the next  
word.  
  
"Reborn."  
  
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The car ride had been appropriately silent. The digital clock  
in front had remorselessly plodded forward on its one-way trek to the  
appointed hour. Neither her mama nor papa had been willing to break the  
silence, and it was not her place to do so.  
  
Her papa had not gone for the usual antics, instead driving the  
car at a slow speed, as though by missing the time what was coming could  
be stopped. Sadly, it was futile. The place they traveled to was not  
required, merely convenient. It could be done here, as well as there.  
  
But she preferred to be alone when it came. She would not have  
to see those she would destroy. It would be her that did it. It was  
inevitable. The ancient pact required it.  
  
That fate had been avoided before, however narrowly. There was  
no one to stop it this time. It would be just her, her and it. A  
foretold dance that would usher in the end, just as the end of the ride  
now came.  
  
She left the two who had taken her there behind, walking up the  
path alone for the moment. But she was soon joined by another.  
  
The other was already attired for her duty, her tool in hand.  
She had greeted her with a nod, and the two had set off, climbing up  
into the night.  
  
As they reached the place where they were to part, she had asked  
the other a question. "Will..." That was all that had been required to  
allow her meaning to be understood.  
  
The other's response was as she had thought. "You know I cannot  
say."  
  
And with that the two had parted ways, and she had gone up alone  
into the high place, and looked out over that which she would destroy.  
  
A thousand points of light.  
  
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She paused for a moment, gazing out on the sea of points, now  
hard to see in the glare she cast. Some were vanishing under her harsh  
light, destroyed as the others would soon be as well.  
  
Her tool hovered, quiet for the moment, hanging like the shadow  
of death over the world. It was almost finished. When the blade  
finished its descent, the end would come.  
  
She too would be destroyed. The void knew not its servants, and  
would not spare them. It would leave neither saints nor sinners behind.  
It would be as nothing had ever been.  
  
The first time she tried, she was unable to say the final word.  
Her tool leapt to life, angry at her failure. The light strengthened,  
consuming her vision.  
  
Blind, unwilling, but unable to stop it, she completed the pact.  
  
"Revolution."  
  
Her tool hummed, energy flowing through it. She wanted to stop,  
wanted someone to tell her it was alright. But, it was not alright. It  
would never be alright again.  
  
Her tool squirmed under her hands, eager to be set free.  
Finally, concentrating on the task at hand to the exclusion of all else,  
she finally brought it down.  
  
The sound of the blade passing through air, to the accompaniment  
of bells below tolling out the midnight hour, was the dirge for the  
universe, heralding its death. It was to be the last sound she ever  
heard.  
  
The thud of her tool hitting the ground caused her to  
involuntarily open her eyes. She nervously glanced downward, relieved  
as she saw the non-bladed end of her tool firmly buried in the earth.  
  
With an unholy scream, the cold light died away, the power she  
had summoned wasted, unable to finish its job. Wordlessly, her uniform  
and tool vanished, returned to whence she had called them.  
  
And she smiled. The bells finished their toll as they rang in  
the new day. Below her, somewhere, new points of light were born.  
  
The past year had been a bad one. There had been war, famine,  
pestilence, and death.  
  
But... perhaps this year would be better. Now, it had a chance  
to try.  
  
"Happy New Year," whispered Tomoe Hotaru.  
  
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End file.
